17 March 1942. Fort Knox, Kentucky, USA
Just recently promoted and now commanding 1st Armored Division, Major-General Orlando Ward hung up the phone with a sigh. There was still no sign of where and when his Division was to move. Ever since they arrived back at Fort Knox on 7 December, they’d been on the alert for a move. Like Major-General Bruce Magurder whom he replaced, Ward had been trying to get some kind of movement orders. The loss of all those good men on the Bataan Peninsula was yet another reason why a fully trained and equipped Armored Division shouldn’t be sitting on its tail, while there was a war going on. Frustration was the main emotion being felt all through the Division, probably the entire US Army.
There’d been all sorts of false alarms, they might be shipped to England, they might be shipped directly to the Philippines, then the rumour was they were off to Australia. Ward and his men just wanted to get into the war. They had two battalions of M3 mediums, one of M3 light tanks, an armoured infantry regiment, the full Field Artillery compliment, reconnaissance, engineers, medical, logistics, everything needed to take the battle to the enemy. Instead, they were sitting around waiting for someone up the chain of command to make a decision. Meanwhile men were bleeding and dying in the Philippines, for want of the kind of firepower that ‘Old Ironsides’ could provide.